


of the empire

by nonbinarywithaknife (littleboxes)



Series: me sobbing about critical role [54]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Timelines, Alternate Universes, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Oneshot, What if?, fuck the cerberus assembly man, one off babey, sort of a drabble but not really?, uh oh magic happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-28
Updated: 2019-03-28
Packaged: 2019-12-25 13:53:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18262631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleboxes/pseuds/nonbinarywithaknife
Summary: nott wakes up in a world unfamiliar, for all its familiarity





	of the empire

**Author's Note:**

> if i dont post something every week minimum i die, thats the facts

There’s a flash. A bang. A feeling like being squeezed through a molehill, and the scent of- strawberries?

Nott wakes up with a rush, eyes flashing open. Her vision is blurry, and she steadies a hand on the ground while it adjusts. _What-?_

There’s a hand on her shoulder, and she can hear voices underneath the ringing in her ears. It sounds, almost, _muffled_. She pauses for a second. _Something’s wrong_.

It almost seems like her senses are dulled. Not to mention- it’s _bright_ , the sun is high in the sky, and- _she can see the sun._

She shakes her head, and then turns to look to see who’s holding her shoulder. She nearly knocks heads, the person is so close, and then, “Caleb! What happened? How long was I out, we were-,”

Her voice dies in her throat. Because- that’s not her voice, that’s _her voice_. That isn’t the horrible screech she’d become reluctantly used to. That’s- that’s the voice of a halfling woman named _Veth Brenatto_ and that is something that _should not be possible_. 

She drags her attention away from the voices- speaking in Zemnian, she can recognize it now that her ears have (mostly) stopped ringing, and instead she stares at her hands. They are slightly calloused, they have five digits, they’re _not goblin_. “What is-? Caleb? _What’s happening?”  
_

She looks to him, and furrows her brows at the look at his face. She takes in the red uniform he’s wearing, how _clean_ he is, and he almost looks- young?

And then he speaks, “Miss? What happened here?”

The words are cold, clinical, spoken smoothly and confidently, which is odd enough, but his _voice_. It’s not the thick accent she’s become used to, it’s- _wrong_. If she listens hard enough, she can catch some of the sounds she’s used to, but it’s almost like- like-

She shakes her head again, this time in a futile attempt to ward away the explanations pounding at her skull. She smiles, desperation shining through. “Caleb, what- what happened to you? What are you wearing, why are you- what happened to your _voice?”  
_

He frowns, the expression looking foreign on his clean shaven face. “Miss, I’m afraid I don’t know who Caleb is. I am Bren Ermendrud, of the Assembly, and you are currently trespassing. I’ll ask again, what happened here?”

It’s only then she notices the two shadows behind him. A woman, hair cut short, wearing an identical red uniform and an elf, head shaved and looking at her with a level of disgust that makes her flinch a little. The woman leans forward and whispers something into Caleb’s ear. 

“No, Astrid, not yet,” he says, and that’s when it hits her, like a hammer to the chest. 

Astrid. _Bren_. Uniforms with a symbol that she recognizes as being the Assembly’s. 

The man standing in front of her is not Caleb Widogast, filthy wizard, lover of cats and books and mud.

The man standing before her is Bren Aldric Ermendrud, a stranger, a mage of the Empire, with cold eyes and a confident bearing, and-

and-

and-

She is Veth.

**Author's Note:**

> if i ever come back to this it won't be for a while but it's been rattlin' around my brain for literal weeks and i had to get it out


End file.
